Free The Pale Horseman by Bernard Cornwell

cloak and a golden crucifix hidden in the cloak's lice-ridden folds. He

would keep his hoard buried, I thought, and I doubted any of us would become rich from this

alliance, but in truth we were not becoming rich from our voyage either, and at least

Peredur would have to feed us while we haggled.
    'The king,' the monk interrupted my thoughts, 'wishes to know how many men you can lead

against the enemy.'
    'Enough,' I said flatly.
    'Does that not depend,' the monk observed slyly, 'on how many enemies there are?'
    'No,' I said. 'It depends on this,' and I slapped Serpent-Breath's hilt. It was a good,

arrogant reply, and probably what the monk expected. And, in truth, it was convincing for

I was broad in the chest and a giant in this hall where I was a full head taller than any other

man.
    'And who are you, monk?' I demanded.
    'My name is Asser,' he said. It was a British name, of course, and in the English tongue it

meant a he-ass, and ever after I thought of him as the Ass. And there was to be a lot of the

ever after for, though I did not know it, I had just met a man who would haunt my life like a

louse. I had met another enemy, though on that day in Peredur's hall he was just a strange

British monk who stood out from his companions because he washed. He invited me to follow

him to a small door at the side of the hall and, motioning Haesten and Cenwulf to stay where

they were, I ducked through the door to find myself standing beside a dung-heap, but the

point of taking me outside had been to show me the view eastwards.
    I stared across a valley. On the nearer slope were the smoke blackened roofs of Peredur's

settlement, then came the thorn fence that had been made along the stream which flowed to the

sea. On the stream's far side the hills rose gently to a far off crest and there, breaking the

skyline like a boil, was Dreyndynas.
    'The enemy,' Asset said.
    A small fort, I noted. 'How many men are there?'
    'Does it matter to you?' Asser asked sourly, paying me back for my refusal to tell him how

many men I led, though I assumed Father Mardoc had made a count of the crew while he was on

board Fyrdraca, so my defiance had been pointless.
    'You Christians,' I said, 'believe that at death you go to heaven. Isn't that right?'
    'What of it?'
    'You must surely welcome such a fate?' I asked. 'To be near your god?'
    'Are you threatening me?'
    'I don't threaten vermin,' I said, enjoying myself. 'How many men are in that fort?'
    'Forty? Fifty?' He plainly did not know. 'We can assemble forty.'
    'So tomorrow,' I said, 'your king can have his fort back.'
    'He is not my king,' Asser said, irritated by the assumption.
    'Your king or not,' I said, 'he can have his fort back so long as he pays us properly.'
    That negotiation lasted until dark. Peredur, as Father Mardoc had said, was willing

to pay more than a hundred shillings, but he feared we would take the money and leave without

fighting and so he wanted some kind of surety from me. He wanted hostages, which I refused

to give, and after an hour or more of argument we had still not reached an agreement, and it

was then that Peredur summoned his queen. That meant nothing to me, but I saw the Ass stiffen

as though he were offended, then sensed that every other man in the hall was strangely

apprehensive. Asser made a protest, but the king cut him off with an abrupt slice of his hand

and then a door at the back of the hall was opened and Iseult came to my life.
    Iseult. Finding her there was like discovering a jewel of gold in a midden. I saw her

and I forgot Mildrith. Dark Iseult, black-haired Iseult, huge-eyed Iseult. She was small, thin

as an elf, with a luminous face and hair as black as a raven's feathers. She wore a black

cloak and had silver bands about her neck and silver bracelets at her wrists and silver rings

at her ankles and the jewellery clinked
    gently as she walked towards us. She was maybe two or three years younger than